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DPH security report: Zuckerberg campus crime down but sheriff calls and use-of-force persist
Summary
Basil Price presented security metrics for Zuckerberg and Laguna Honda hospitals: a 22% drop in campus crime at Zuckerberg, 124 sheriff use-of-force incidents (119 at Zuckerberg) in the year reported, high rates of sheriff responses to patient incidents, and steps including crisis prevention training and a behavioral emergency response team.
Basil Price, director of security for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, told the commission the department has made security program gains while also identifying ongoing opportunities to reduce law-enforcement involvement in patient incidents.
Price said the security program tracked eight milestone accomplishments across performance, emergency department security, threat management, training and electronic security. He reported a 22% decrease in crime on the Zuckerberg campus compared with the prior year and said overall satisfaction with security services was 90% at Zuckerberg and 81% at Laguna Honda. "We were able to actually replace the systems vendor at Zuckerberg, where we're now getting more timely response in regards to any system malfunctions," Price said.
On law-enforcement use-of-force, Price said there were 124 incidents during the reporting year in which sheriff's deputies used some degree of force to affect an arrest or address risk behavior; 119 of those incidents were at Zuckerberg and five were at Laguna Honda. He said this was down from 173 incidents the year before and that year-to-date counts showed 58 incidents.
Price and commissioners discussed the role of the sheriff's department under the memorandum of understanding between DPH and the sheriff; Price said 20 elements of the MOU are measured monthly and the sheriff's department exceeded targets for MOU compliance. He also said the sheriff's department responded to about 4,000 calls last year for patient assist, standby or restraint and that roughly 40% of use-of-force incidents involved patients.
To reduce reliance on law enforcement, Price said DPH is implementing crisis prevention training for direct patient care staff and providing the same training for sheriff deputies, developing an emergency department response plan to address risk behavior before law enforcement is engaged, and piloting a behavioral emergency response team to provide de-escalation support in high-risk units.
Commissioners thanked Price for the report and pressed for continued improvements in data integration so the department can better answer questions about demographics, origin of individuals involved and precise locations of incidents.
